Video telephones are characterized in that image pickup cameras thereof take images of calling and called parties, respectively, so that the calling and called parties can speak to each other while seeing the partner sides. However, there is a case that it is troublesome due to the calling party's convenience to take an image of the calling party, such as a case that the calling party does not want to make the person on the partner side know the circumstance of the calling party in detail. In this case, the portrait right of the picked up image, for example, the privacy of the calling party should be protected.
As a general countermeasure in the case of requiring the protection of such privacy etc., there is a method that a person leaves from the image pickup camera. However, in this case, it may become difficult to speak depending on the relative positional relation between the person and a receiver/microphone in a portable device, in particular. Further, as another countermeasure, it is considered to turn off an image to be transmitted. However, in each of these countermeasures, there arises a sense of incongruity that the calling and called parties can not see the partner sides to each other despite of using the video telephone.
Further, as another countermeasure, it is considered to provide a means for transmitting an image representative of a name card picked up in advance. However, in this case, there arises a problem that a present state of the partner side can not be seen well since the transmitted image is a static image.
In this manner, each of the aforesaid countermeasures has a problem that the communication is equal to that using only voice and so the telephone is not necessarily required to be a video telephone, so that a calling party can not sufficiently use the function of the video telephone. Thus, at present, the video telephones have not been spread sufficiently due to the problem of such a portrait right.
The invention has been made in view of the aforesaid circumstances and an object of the invention is to provide a video telephone which makes it possible to speak while seeing a motion picture of a partner side and while protecting the portrait right of a calling party using the video telephone as the need arises.